James Earl Jones: Much loved actor responsible for voice of Darth Vader and Lion King’s Mufasa dies aged 93

The much-loved actor James Earl Jones, responsible for the voice of Darth Vader in Star Wars and a raft of iconic roles, has died aged 93.

Earl Jones, who voiced sci-fi villain Darth Vader and also starred in cult classic movies such as Field of Dreams and Coming To America, died at his home in Dutchess County on Monday.

His agent, Barry McPherson, confirmed Jones had passed but the cause was not immediately clear.

Regarded as one of the world’s great stage and screen actors, Jones was widely known for many iconic roles, including King Mufasa’s voice in The Lion King.

Jones made his film debut in Stanley Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove in 1964 and played many roles on stage and screen before he shot to international fame for his voice portrayal as Darth Vader in the Star Wars franchise, beginning with the original 1977 film.

He will be remembered for other memorable film roles including the reclusive writer coaxed back into the spotlight in Field of Dreams, the boxer Jack Johnson in the stage and screen hit The Great White Hope, the writer Alex Haley in Roots: The Next Generation and a South African minister in Cry, the Beloved Country.

Other notable roles include in Conan the Barbarian (1982), Coming to America (1988), Field of Dreams (1989), The Hunt for Red October (1990) and The Lion King (1994).

He was inducted into the American Theatre Hall of Fame in 1985 and was honoured with the National Medal of Arts in 1992, the Kennedy Center Honour in 2002, the Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award in 2009 and the Honorary Academy Award in 2011.

He was nominated for a Lead Actor Oscar for his role in The Great White Hope (1971) and was given an honorary Oscar at the 2012 ceremony. An eight-time Emmy nominee, his two wins both came in 1991: Lead Actor in a Drama Series for Gabriel’s Fire and Supporting Actor in a Miniseries or a Special for Heat Wave.

He cut an elegant figure late in life, with a wry sense of humour and a ferocious work habit. In 2015, he arrived at rehearsals for a Broadway run of The Gin Game having already memorised the play and with notebooks filled with comments from the creative team. He said he was always in service of the work.

“The need to storytell has always been with us,” he told The Associated Press then.

“I think it first happened around campfires when the man came home and told his family he got the bear, the bear didn’t get him.”

Jones created such memorable film roles as the reclusive writer coaxed back into the spotlight in Field of Dreams, the boxer Jack Johnson in the stage and screen hit The Great White Hope, the writer Alex Haley in Roots: The Next Generation and a South African minister in Cry, the Beloved Country.

“If you were an actor or aspired to be an actor, if you pounded the payment in these streets looks for jobs, one of the standards we always had was to be a James Earl Jones,” Samuel L Jackson once said.

Jones made his Broadway debut in 1958’s Sunrise At Campobello and would win his two Tony Awards for The Great White Hope (1969) and Fences (1987). He also was nominated for On Golden Pond (2005) and Gore Vidal’s The Best Man (2012). He was celebrated for his command of Shakespeare and Athol Fugard alike. More recent Broadway appearances include Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Driving Miss Daisy, The Iceman Cometh, and You Can’t Take It With You.

Jones was born by the light of an oil lamp in a shack in Arkabutla, Mississippi, on January 17, 1931. His father, Robert Earl Jones, had deserted his wife before the baby’s arrival to pursue life as a boxer and, later, an actor.

When Jones was six, his mother took him to her parents’ farm near Manistee, Michigan. His grandparents adopted the boy and raised him.

“A world ended for me, the safe world of childhood,” Jones wrote in his autobiography, Voices and Silences.

“The move from Mississippi to Michigan was supposed to be a glorious event. For me it was a heartbreak, and not long after, I began to stutter.”

With AAP.